Although we still have to wait until this Friday, September 20th to purchase a new iPhone 5S or 5C, those of us with existing compatible iOS devices will be able to upgrade to iOS 7 starting tomorrow. Are you ready?

How to prepare your device for the iOS 7 upgrade

Although we still have to wait until this Friday, September 20th to purchase a new iPhone 5S or 5C in Apple stores and other authorized dealers, those of us with existing compatible iOS devices will be able to upgrade to iOS 7 starting tomorrow when Apple releases the update to the masses. We still don’t know exactly when that will be, so be sure to check back here often throughout the day for up to the minute information.

iOS 7 is Apple newest and most advanced operating system to date, with many calling it a game changer for Apple. With dozens of improvements and new features like iTunes Radio, Control Center, Air Drop, smarter multi-tasking and many more, the demand for the initial download will be extremely high. A bit of warning–unless Apple releases the update in the middle of the night or very early in the morning, you will be better served to wait until tomorrow evening to download the update. The heavy load on Apple’s servers have slowed the pace to a crawl in the past, often causing users to start the process repeatedly to successfully complete a download.

Should I wait to upgrade to iOS 7?

Something to consider that often gets lost in all the excitement of a new OS release/refresh–should I upgrade? Not all apps have been updated to be compatible with iOS 7 yet. Many developers will be burning the midnight oil to make their apps iOS 7 compatible, but many simply won’t be ready by tomorrow. In addition, some developers are starting from scratch with iOS 7, and creating a new app takes time, so they won’t be ready either. We advise you to check on the status of your favorite/most used/can’t live without apps and make sure they have been updated before you update. There definitely has been an avalanche of new updates in the recent days–but check to be sure.

Preparing for the upgrade to iOS 7

But before you update to iOS 7 there are a few things you should do first to prepare your device for the update. The iPhone is 6 years old now, and even though Apple has been very good at supporting older versions of the device, not all of them will be capable of running iOS 7, nor will they all support all of the most recently added features. So just to be sure you should start by checking to make sure your iOS device is compatible.

iOS 7 will support the following devices

iPhone 4

iPhone 4S

iPhone 5

iPad 2

iPad 3

iPad 4

iPad mini

5th gen iPod Touch

Back up your iOS device

Seems like a no brainer, but every year there are those who fail to take this very easy step, potentially costing them dearly. I wouldn’t expect to have any problems upgrading to iOS 7. However, if you do, at least with a recently backed up version waiting in the wings, you know you will be made whole again if anything should go wrong before, during or after the upgrade process.

How to back up your device

Ever since the creation of iCloud we have had two main ways available to back up our iOS devices. You could go old-school and back up directly to iTunes, or you could allow your device to back-up daily to iCloud if you have enough storage available.

With iTunes, you also can choose to back-up device wirelessly over your local Wi-fi network, or you can always manually connect your iOS device to your computer with its included charging cord. To back up your device to iTunes make sure it is recognized and visible in the left-hand side margin. In iTunes 11.0.5 if you do not see the side bar you can reveal it by clicking view–>show side-bar. At this point when you select your Summary Tab from the top of the page you will see your available back-up options. Here you can select iCloud to automatically back-up your device nightly while you sleep. In addition, you can force a manual back-up by selecting ‘Back Up Now’ or you can click the ‘control’ button on your Mac, and click on the device you want to back.

Download and install the latest version of iTunes

iTunes 11.0.5 is the most recent version of the software. However, we fully expect to see an upgrade along side iOS 7 tomorrow sometime. So make sure you are running the latest version so that your update will provide you with the latest features like iTunes Radio.

How to download iOS 7 to your device

When iOS 7 is finally available to download there are two main ways to install it on your iOS device. Personally, I favor the OTA (over-the-air) update to downloading the update in iTunes, but both are adequately reliable and easy enough to complete. On the first day a new OS becomes available to download OTA it can be slow as molasses to complete the installation. Of course there are always exceptions, but in my experience slow OTA updates are the reason I usually wait to update until late in the evening of the first day it becomes available. To check and see if an OTA update is ready to be downloaded select Settings–>General–>Software Update.

The software update process is equally easy and painless over iTunes. Simply plug in your device to your computer, if you do not have ‘synch with Wi-fi’ already selected, and then choose ‘Check For Updates’ in the Summary tab. If a newer version of iOS is available to download you will be given the opportunity to complete that task at this time.

Make sure to check back often here on iSource tomorrow starting early in the morning, and we will be sure to let you know when you will be able to upgrade your iOS device to the most powerful OS Apple has yet to offer.

Featured

That’s s good question. I’m not sure we’ll know specifics until iOS 7 drops. If I hear sooner I’ll update the post with the info

tom

asked for 3.1 gb when i did the OTA

Renkman

Cool, thanks Tom.

Erica Reams

Mine won’t update… Says software isn’t available at this time… Waited 40 minutes and deleted 15 apps for space, and nothing… The download is in the phone but won’t update.. Already have turned everything off so that settings is the only other thing open… Frustrated!! Any advice?

Renkman

You definitely have 3.1-3.4 GB available? How low is your battery?

Renkman

My guess is that the Apple servers are still being beaten into submission, and it might take several repeated attempts for it to go through. One of our writers had the same exact issue, and he just kept trying until it finally installed.

phatmanXXL [16,000+ posts]

Get an android

Renkman

Why on Earth would she do that? If her Android device was_ever_updated chances are it would be months after the update was available. Apple is updating across multiple devices on the same day–not one here, one two months after that, then maybe another one by the end of the year.